The Draugur
by Red-Eyed Ryuu
Summary: "Look, guy," Danny began, meeting War Paint's eyes, "as fun as it is to play Viking with you and your merry group of hairy men, I've kinda got places to be, people to see—you know how it is."


**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Danny Phantom_ or _How to Train Your Dragon_.

* * *

**The Draugur:** Chapter 1

* * *

"It's nice to _finally_ catch a break," Danny groaned out as he flew through the darkening sky. He was a bit unsteady on his metaphorical wings but it was to be expected, having just narrowly escaped a rather nasty encounter with Spectra and her annoying henchman, Bertrand.

As much as Danny hated to admit it, Spectra was one of the ghosts he dreaded confronting the most. Not only was she a pain in the ass in a physical fight but she always, _always_, managed to know just what to say to get under his skin in the worst possible way—making him question himself—if what he was doing was even worth it, if he was actually doing any good. That wasn't even factoring in Bertrand, that annoying side-kick or whatever he was to her, who would always add in some stupid jab to worsen the blow to his psyche.

One of the two was tough enough, but fighting both alone?

Danny shook his head. It was _not_ his idea of a fun time by any means. He wasn't even sure what had started the altercation. Maybe simply existing had triggered the whole thing. One minute Danny's enjoying a leisurely flight through the Ghost Zone, having just finished a particularly rigorous sparring session with Frostbite and the other residents of the Far Frozen, and the next, he's suddenly engaged in a tooth and nail battle against one of his toughest enemies.

There was no questioning the fact that Danny had been in no shape to face someone of Spectra's caliber and come out in any other shape than a bloody, messy pile of ectoplasm and gore. Some might chastise him for running, for not putting up more of a fight, but Danny was simply way too tired.

So, only exchanging blows as necessary to defend himself and to stall the two, Danny had taken to the nearest floating purple door, hoping to seek refuge in another ghost's lair just long enough to regroup—to catch his breath. He had had his fingers crossed, holding out hope that the owner of the lair wouldn't attack him for the intrusion.

And that's where Danny now found himself flying through the sky at his own pace.

With a sigh of relief, Danny felt the tension in his body ease a little. It seemed as if his luck was holding out for once. What an incredibly rare, miraculous occurrence.

The tired teen wasn't sure how long he had been hiding out in the place, flying along the surface of an incredibly large, dark ocean but he was surprised (and honestly a bit relieved) that he had yet to come across the owner of the lair. It had to have been around five, maybe ten minutes tops.

_'Whatever_,' he thought, he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Not when he so sorely needed the respite.

Letting out another heavy sigh of relief, Danny was suddenly overcome by a heavy wave of exhaustion, his adrenalin rush no doubt fully subsiding.

Biting back a yawn, Danny took a moment to scour the land below. Ocean was still the predominate aspect, but as he squinted and strained his eyes, he spotted a dark spot a bit further ahead; an island coming into view. Danny quickly set his course and in no time was setting his booted feet upon the craggy surface.

"Typical Ghost Zone décor," Danny mused with a dry chuckle.

The landscape that spread before him was rather bleak and dreary, barely any vegetation aside from some pathetic, wiry shrubs and tall, dark trees barren of and sort of foliage. He had the passing thought that they rather reminded him of the trees once scattered across Aragon's kingdom, before Dora had taken over. Stone and ocean seemed to make up the vast majority of this particular lair—not the most cheerful of looking places, but hey, it could be worse, right?

As Danny spent the next few minutes wondering the island, the thought that this particular lair might be vacant was beginning to creep into his mind. That is, until gruff yells and heavy footfalls met his ears.

He should have known it was only a matter of time before his luck turned sour…

"Intruder!" someone yelled seconds before Danny found himself flattened beneath a heavy rope net.

"What the-" Danny started, caught off guard. So much for the place being abandoned.

Faster than Danny thought possible, a large group of very muscled, hairy, and armored men had him surrounded. He thought they kind of looked like Vikings, actually—really hairy, angry looking Vikings. He also found it rather interesting how very _human_ they all still looked.

Danny gulped, a bit unsettled by this turn of events. Tired and drained as he was, the teen decided he'd play along with this scenario for a bit, rather than risk expending himself any further by jumping headlong into another fight. With an uneasy frown, eyes darting left and right, Danny slowly raised his arms along the side of his head in surrender.

A couple men quickly grabbed him by the arms and hefted the scrawny, submissive teen to his feet, roughly tearing the netting away and painfully twisting Danny's arms behind his back.

"Well, well, well," someone cooed, causing Danny to pause in his glaring at the men handling him. The teen averted his gaze to survey the people surrounding him, his sights eventually settling on a young man making his way through the mass of bodies. The guy looked no older than Danny, with a build similar to Dash's (he even had that 'holier-than-thou' expression to match the jock's).

'_Not _another_ one of those jerks_,' Danny groaned at the thought.

The restrained teen noted that this guy was also decked out in Viking-esque armor with a deadly looking, double-sided axe in one hand, weird blue paint (war paint?) on his face and a helmet that seemed to be adorned with impala (?) horns. He, too, had an incredibly human (not to mention arrogant) appearance. How curious…

'_This is really weird,_' Danny thought to himself, an unease beginning to swell in the pit of his gut.

"And who might you be?" War Paint sneered, his tone belying his interest in actually receiving an answer.

Danny scrunched up his face, and if not for the men holding him, would have taken a few steps back at the invasion of his personal space.

"Wow_,_" Danny started, "ever heard of mouthwash …or a _shower_, for that matter?_'_ The teen did his best to contain a shudder at the offending stench radiating from his captors.

War Paint scowled at Danny, his eyes narrowing into a glare, his lips tight. He mouthed what Danny thought looked suspiciously like 'mouthwash' before turning to a man at his side and saying, "He doesn't look like one of Hiccup's goody-good friends…" then turned away. Danny found himself thinking War Paint almost looked… disappointed?

"Sir!" A man a bit further off called as he fumbled his way towards the group. "We haven't found any sign of dragons or boats nearby." He reported.

Danny frowned, his brows creasing. Boat? Why would he need a boat? And what was that about dragons? Curiouser…

"What would I need a boat for?" Danny questioned, electing to voice his confusion.

War Paint rounded on Danny, the eye of his axe pressing against the teen's chin. "Don't play koi with me!" he roared, his face nearly touching Danny's (oh great, there's that horrendous stench again…). "You're working with Hiccup, aren't you?" he demanded with a scowl, a strange glint in his eyes.

'_Oookay,_' Danny thought as the guy slowly pulled away, still scowling. '_It doesn't take a rocket scientist to tell this guy's off his rocker…_'

Danny snorted—he couldn't help it.

"Hiccup?" he chuckled, unable to subdue his laughter. "That is not seriously someone's name, is it?" He moved to wipe a tear from his eye, only to be reminded that he was still being restrained. Danny simply shrugged it off as he continued, "Oh man, who seriously names their kid that?"

War Paint's face twisted in confusion, as if he was unsure how to interpret Danny's behavior and sudden outburst. Why wasn't this kid cowering in fear? Why was he LAUGHING instead of crying for mercy, for his life?

"Oh man," Danny went on as he shifted his footing and rolled his shoulders. "What a weird lair—with even weirder inhabitants!" He chuckled.

"What're you-" War Paint started before Danny interjected.

"Look, guy," Danny began, meeting War Paint's eyes, "as fun as it is to play Viking with you and your merry group of hairy men, I've kinda got places to be, people to see—you know how it is." And in the blink of an eye, Danny was in motion.

He twisted and mercilessly brought a knee to the gut of the man holding his right arm, putting enough force into the motion to cause the man to buckle in pain, releasing Danny's arm as he crumpled to the ground. Taking advantage of his free hand, Danny pulled the remaining man on his left towards him as he shifted, mirroring the action with another swift kick to the guy's vulnerable gut. As the second body fell to the ground, Danny quickly leapt into the air, his fists igniting in acidic, flaming green ectoplasm.

Running on fumes or not, Danny wasn't about to go down without a fight. Besides, he could only handle playing along for so long. There was only so much his pride could handle.

The ghostly teen had expected a quick and merciless retaliation-bodies and weapons flying at him from every direction-but what he got was something else entirely. Instead of any of that, all he received were countless frightened stares and panicked muttering. It was as if these men had never seen an ignited ball of ectoplasm before.

'_Weird…_' Danny frowned, '_what kind of ghosts aren't familiar with ectoplasm?_'

"What is it?!" Danny heard someone whisper, the voice awestruck and laden with fear.

"Did you see how its hands suddenly erupted into flames? Just like a Monstrous Nightmare!"

What the heck was a 'monstrous nightmare'?

"Look! It's floating in the air!" Another man cried.

"A demon!" Yet another cried, adding to the hysterics.

"It's a spirit! An angry spirit!"

Danny's frown deepened. Why were they acting so surprised? Weren't they also ghosts?

"_Hel_-_blár_!" Someone yelled in a language completely foreign to Danny. And as if that word were a trigger, sheer chaos quickly erupted.

Men scrambled and ran about, screaming in terror and spouting words Danny had no hope of understanding. All the teen could think to do was gawk; just what the heck kind of wacked-out lair was this? Unless…

'_No!_' Danny thought as he fiercely shook his head to clear the thought from his mind. There was no way he was going to jump to that conclusion. Not yet. Not without proof.

"I just have to find the door…" he muttered to himself in a feeble attempt to reassure himself. He took to the sky, completely toning out the chaos left in his wake. It's not like he even had to worry about dodging attacks, as the Vikings appeared to be busy stumbling over one another in a frantic attempt to get as far from Danny as they could.

Danny concluded he just needed to find the door he had entered this lair through. Spectra wouldn't hang around waiting for him _this long_, even if she had seem him escape through that door, so he'd be home free. He'd find the door, go through it, fly home and never have to worry about this weird lair where its residents didn't even know they were dead.

Yeah. That's it. That's exactly what he'd do—that's exactly what would happen. Everything would work out perfectly.

"Get out of this lair and get home," he told himself. "Everything'll be fine." Danny was sure of it.

* * *

As the ghostly teen flew off in the direction he had come, the men he left in his wake slowly began to recollect themselves.

Dagur, or War Pain, as Danny had referred to him, stood firm amongst his otherwise terrified men. He was watching the creature—for it certainly was not human despite its appearance—as it flew off.

Dagur had no idea what this 'door' the creature had been talking about was, nor did he honestly care. What _did_ interest him was the _power_ it undoubtedly possessed—the way it fearlessly faced him and his men as if it had the confidence, the certainty, that it would be able to handle them all with no contest.

A shudder wracked through his body; a cold chill passing through every muscle. Oh, the creature surely terrified him, there was no question there, and though he may be "deranged", he was not stupid. More than fearful, Dagur found an odd sense of excitement budding within him. Imagine if he could harness that kind of power—make it his. Not even Hiccup and his Night Furry would be able to stand against him!

If only he could figure out a way to control that creature, that _Draugur_, he'd have the world at his fingertips!

* * *

"Where is it? _Where is it_!?"

Danny wasn't sure how long he had been flying since departing that Viking infested island, but it was apparently long enough for the sky to transition from night to day—another unsettling detail that something wasn't quite right with this lair.

As far as Danny knew, the Ghost Zone, nor any of the lairs he had ever been to, ever cycled between night and day. They were always stagnant, perpetually stuck to reflect the world as its creator was most comfortable with.

As time continued to draw on, Danny's doubts only grew. It didn't help that he'd found no trace of the door he had entered, either. He had been flying well past the distance he remembered having taken to get to that island, with nothing but ocean and scattered bits of rock jutting out from its surface as far as he could see.

That horrible lump of dread was beginning to weigh down heavier in the pit of his gut. He didn't like where all these clues were leading him.

He bit at his lower lip, focusing on the pain to distract his frantic mind. Oh why, why, _why_ did the universe hate him so much? Nothing could _ever_ go his way, could it? Find a way out of a nasty fight, only to get lost in ti-

"NOPE." Danny yelled at himself, interrupting the thought. "That is _not_ what happened. That is _not_ what's going on. I probably just… missed the door, is all…" He closed his eyes in an attempt to visualize the area he had emerged from… and frowned. All he could come up with was water, the sky, and angry, hairy Vikings with bad make-up and a lack in personal hygiene.

"ARGH!" he exclaimed. "This is so _stupid_!" he growled out, thumping the side of his head with a fist. "This is so stupid! And annoying! And I'm just. So. Tired..."

All too quickly Danny became aware of the fact that his eyes were still closed, that at some point during his ranting he'd managed to let go of his ghostly half, and that he was without a doubt plummeting from the sky. And while a more rational part of his brain told him he should probably be panicking right about now, that he should probably open his eyes and go ghost or prepare for impact, another part of him simply… didn't care, too tired and exhausted and _done_ because wouldn't it be nice to just let go for a bit and take a nice, long nap?

* * *

Danny was out like a light well before his body collided with the ocean, skidding and skipping along the surface a good few hundred feet before finally coming to rest a good distance from the initial impact area. His body, bruised and battered from the less than ideal landing, bobbed with the gentle lull of the ocean's waves, and before the ocean could lay claim to the unconscious teen, strong arms reached forward and hefted the boy aboard a small, wooden ship.

* * *

_**A/N:** I don't even remember how long I've been working on this crossover. I've probably been thinking about it since December, but didn't start plotting it out on paper until around March? Yeah, that's definitely when I started writing up outlines and started drawing some things... I had hoped to have this first chapter out by early July but, well... a lot of things've been going on lately that ended up pushing back the release. Sorry about that!;; I'm glad to finally push this one out though, as it's something I've really been wanting to do for a while now (you should see all the notes and drabbles I have written for this in my notebook). Unfortunately, there's no guarantied update schedule because I'm really bad with schedules but my aim is to have something out at least each month or perhaps bi-monthly, inspiration willing. Hopefully things aren't too wonky with this chapter, but if you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to let me know in a review!_


End file.
